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Donald Trump does not usually take counsel, especially from international figures who often seek to flatter and compliment the American leader.

But, El Salvador's strongman president Bukele has adopted a distinct approach by calling on the White House to emulate his actions in impeaching what he terms “dishonest judges.”

His appeal for the president to move against the US judiciary also received support from Maga figures, such as an X post by one-time supporter Elon Musk, who has previously amplified Bukele's demands to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Court Autonomy

Experts say that the leader's recent remarks come at a time of unmatched threats to judicial independence and individual judges in the US, and during a phase where the president's team is employing comparable strong-arm tactics employed by leaders in nations such as Turkey, Hungary, India, and his native the Central American country to weaken democratic accountability.

Bukele's social media statement recently was just the latest in a string of provocations and allegations he has made against the American judiciary, such as a spring claim that the US was “experiencing a court takeover,” and his mockery of a court's order to halt deportation flights sending accused undocumented individuals to his country's brutal prison system.

Criticism on Oregon Justice

The Salvadoran's demand for removal was also issued during social media attacks on the state's federal judge Judge Immergut by White House aide Miller, attorney general Pam Bondi, Musk, and Trump personally in a latest media briefing.

Immergut had issued injunctions preventing the administration from mobilizing the national guard, initially in Oregon then in the West Coast state. The president has been pushing to dispatch soldiers into the city, which the leader has characterized as “war-ravaged” based on small, peaceful demonstrations outside the city's homeland security facility.

History of Attacking Judges

Miller, the former AG, and Musk have a history of criticizing judges who have blocked presidential directives or otherwise impeded the administration's political agenda. Prior to resuming office recently, Trump urged his followers against judges overseeing his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with threats and harassment.

Monitoring groups, law enforcement agencies, and judges themselves have pointed to a heightened atmosphere of risks and intimidation in the period since he re-entered the presidency.

Rising Threat Statistics

Based on information gathered by the federal agency, in the current year through the third quarter, there were 562 threats to 395 US justices, giving rise to 805 investigations. This year has already surpassed the first recorded year, and 2024, and is on track to exceed 2023's high of over six hundred reported incidents.

The dangers are not only happening at the federal level. Data from Princeton's research project indicates that there have been at least 59 instances of intimidation, targeting, stalking, or physical attacks directed against judges on the local level in 2025.

Analyst Analysis on Threat Sources

Specialists say that the threats are a result of the rhetoric coming from senior administration figures.

In May, the watchdog group published a comprehensive report alleging that “harmful and highly irresponsible statements from Trump administration members and allies coincide with escalating aggressive posts on social media.” It recorded “a fifty-four percent increase in demands for removal and violent threats against judges across social media platforms from January to February of this year, the first full month of Trump’s administration.”

Beirich, the founder of GPAHE, said: “Trump’s threats against judges have definitely driven online vitriol at judges and demands for ouster. Attacking the judiciary is one more step in Trump’s march towards strongman rule.”

International Strongman Playbook

That march towards autocracy has been well-trodden in recent years in several nations, such as by Bukele.

In several years ago, immediately after commencing a second term in the face of legal bans, the president's parliamentary loyalists voted to remove the country’s top prosecutor and five judges on the constitutional court. The judges, who had angered him by ruling against coronavirus measures, made way for replacements hand picked by Bukele.

The action echoed Viktor Orbán’s overhaul of the nation's judiciary several years back; the Turkish president's judicial purges in 2019; and efforts at similar moves in the Middle Eastern state and the European country.

Weakening Judicial Independence

Experts say that the threats and verbal assaults in the US can be viewed as efforts to weaken court autonomy in a system that offers no easy way for the president to dismiss judges Trump opposes.

Leonard, an associate professor at Illinois State University who has researched democratic decline in democracies, said the Trump administration had taken cues from the models set by authoritarians abroad.

“The administration is observing at these achievements and setbacks. They know they’re not going to be able to pass any laws that would undermine the courts,” she said.

Citing examples such as Miller’s relentless assertions of broad executive power, she noted: “They openly attack the courts by stating over and over that it is not a equal branch in the government structure.

“They persist in redefine the debate by repeating their claim that the executive has more power than this other co-equal branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

The professor said: “Judges' only protection is public trust in the authority of their capacity to make those rulings. Personal intimidation on top of weakening institutional legitimacy may make judges think twice about judgments that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, massively problematic for judicial review and for democracy.”

Intimidation Tactics

Kim Lane Scheppele, professor of sociology and global studies at Princeton University, has documented the use of “authoritarian law” by the likes of Orbán and Putin, and has spoken out about escalating dangers to judges in the US.

She pointed to a series of so-called “harassment deliveries” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited food orders with the customer listed as a name, the child of Justice Salas, who was murdered at the residence in 2020 by a assailant aiming at Salas.

“All knows what it means. ‘We know where you live. You are a target,’” Scheppele said.

“Federal judges are protected by the Secret Service and the Marshals Service. And those are both dedicated law enforcement that sit institutionally inside the federal agency. And the former AG has been leading the attacks on justices.”

Administration Aims

On the administration’s aims, the expert said that “impeaching a US justice is almost certainly not going to happen because it’s very difficult to do. {Right now|Currently